Jessica Harrington © Photo Healy Racing
Jessica Harrington’s yard has a very different profile now, as the most successful dual-purpose trainer on the planet, to when she bagged the Guinness Galway Hurdle with Oh So Grumpy 30 years ago but the Gold Cup, Champion Hurdle and Classic winner is looking forward to sending a strong team west next week.
The Galway Festival gets under way next Monday and Harrington held a press event at Commonstown Stables, just outside the village of Moone, to detail her plans as well as take a trip down memory lane.
The weather and final pieces of work will dictate who makes the daily journey.
Yashin, Norwalk Havoc and Bluedrum are among the possibles, while runner-up on debut, Loch Tay and Marazion, a Sea The Stars half-sister to another Harrington charge Trevaunance, could participate in juvenile maidens with strong chances.
Among the jumpers, Ashdale Bob would be among the most experienced competitors in novice chase contests, experience that stood to him when he scored in a beginners' chase at Kilbeggan last month. That was his first tilt at the larger obstacles in two and a half years after a fruitful return to hurdles.
“Yashin might run in Galway but I’m not sure if the ground would be quick enough,” said Harrington. “I’d love to find a good conditions’ race to give him a chance to get his head back in front.
“He was very unlucky in (the Ebor) last year. It’s the plan at the moment (to go back) though I’m not sure. He’s back cantering away. He was sick after he ran in Newcastle in the Northumberland Plate so he’s just coming back from that.
“Norwalk Havoc runs in the Colm Quinn Mile and as a three-year-old will have all the allowances. He has been running in listed and group races and running well.
“Bluedrum could go for the Listed Corrib Stakes and Curvature has an entry in that too, but would need it soft.
“Ashdale Bob might have only won his beginners’ chase last month, but he has run in plenty of chases so he is very likely to go to Galway.”
Harrington cautions that while it might be the aim of many owners to have a runner at Galway, Ballybrit is not a track that is suited to every horse.
The programme throughout seven fevered days of action is such, however, that there are countless opportunities if you do possess a ‘Galway horse’.
She said: “We love Galway and always want to have winners up there, but you’ve just gotta get the right horse to go there because Galway is unique. And horses that run well there once tend to run well there again after.
“You have the big races that everyone would love to win, but the great thing about Galway is that there’s something for everyone. There’s a good chance an owner will get a horse to Galway, a handicapper or a maiden as well as a high-class horse.
“Some good two-year-olds run in Galway and go on to very good things, right to the top level. But what makes it is that it’s good for everyone.”
As for that famous day in 1994, when Mark Dwyer booted Oh So Grumpy up that famed, rising finish?
“When you’re starting off training and you get a winner of a high profile race it’s fantastic because it kind of puts you on the map," she said.
“He was third in a handicap hurdle in Limerick and I said then he’s gonna go in the Galway Hurdle and we’ll run him in a couple of flat races along the way and that’s what he did.”
